How to Care for a Curry Plant With Brown Tips on the Leaves

Curry plants (Helichrysum italicum) are perennial herbs that can be grown in the home garden. However, they are not the plants from which curry powder is derived--curry powder is a mixture of many different types of spices. Curry plants are also grown for their ornamental qualities and for their oil. If the curry plants in your garden are beginning to turn brown on the leaf tips, several reasons could be the cause. Though it could be harmless, a proper diagnosis could save your plants.

Insecticidal soap
Insecticide
Garden hose

Instructions

- 1
  Examine the leaves, including the undersides, for pests. Aphids and thrips could be feeding on the curry plants, causing the leaves to start dying at the tips. Treat damaging insects as soon as possible, such as naturally with an insecticidal soap or with an appropriate insecticide.
- 2
  Flush the soil with 2 to 3 inches of water if you have recently fertilized the curry plants. You may have over-fertilized. Also, rinse the leaves. Fertilizer could have touched and burned them.
- 3
  Remove an affected leaf and take it to a nursery or county extension office for inspection and diagnosis. The browning could be caused from a disease, such as bacterial leaf spot. If it is a disease, take steps to reduce its spread. For example, remove and discard the affected leaves, lower the humidity around the plants or treat the curry plants with a fungicide. Treatment varies depending on the specific disease.

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